


kinktober 2019 - day 5

by birdginia



Series: Kinktober 2019 [5]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: F/M, Knifeplay, Masochism, Messy Bitches Using Each Other, Mild Sexual Content, Questionably Romantic Content, Sadism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-05
Updated: 2019-10-05
Packaged: 2020-11-24 15:03:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20909594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/birdginia/pseuds/birdginia
Summary: "You enjoy such pain, my lord?" She asked, the first time he handed her own knife to her. "'Tis no wonder you thrive in battle so.""Hardly," he said, lying back and exposing his chest to her. "It is dull as their blades, when they lack true passion for bloodsport." He looked into her eyes, and she felt her very soul laid bare. "One such as you, however..."





	kinktober 2019 - day 5

Zenos' blood blooms so beautifully from his chest, as if his body is filled with crimson flowers and her knife is the sun that makes them open up to the world. Yotsuyu makes another cut along his ribcage, swift and clean, and watches with something like awe as the beads of blood bubble up just as exquisitely.

It's always a rare event, when the viceroy and actor thereof are in close enough proximity and of an open enough schedule to steal away into one of their chambers—lips never touching, hands never held, only a shuffle of clothes and a silent agreement on who holds the knife first. Tonight, Yotsuyu has the jeweled dagger she usually keeps strapped to her thigh in one hand, drawing lines down his body, tracing each bone in bright, beautiful red.

Zenos does not flinch. It's a blessing as well as a curse—her delicate strokes are not interrupted by a sudden twitch of a muscle, and she takes pride in this work—but to see a man under her blade not cowering or begging for mercy does try her patience.

Still, she must wait. She knows her time does not go wasted with her Lord.

She does not tarry long, finishing her outline with a deeper stroke over his sternum. Occasionally she will play longer, carving pleasing designs and bloody filigree into his skin just to watch the patterns open and bleed into each other. But tonight, she puts the knife down the second she finishes with the basic outline. It's enough to satisfy.

She caresses his chest, as she might her "lovers" past, and smiles as the blood smears from the freshest cuts and cracks from the eldest.

Then she delicately places her fingers upon the uppermost wounds, one under each hand, and digs her nails in, as deep as they will go.

The feeling of torn flesh, of spilled blood, of involuntary twitches of muscle that even Lord Zenos cannot hide, is overwhelming. His face finally loses its neutral, almost bored facade, a smile breaking across it like shattering ice.

("You enjoy such pain, my lord?" She asked, the first time he handed her own knife to her. "'Tis no wonder you thrive in battle so."

"Hardly," he said, lying back and exposing his chest to her. "It is dull as their blades, when they lack true passion for bloodsport." He looked into her eyes, and she felt her very soul laid bare. "One such as you, however..."

Yotsuyu wondered if love might exist after all.)

She sinks all of her rage into her claws, all of the pain dealt to her brought forth tenfold, and she marvels as the pattern she so carefully carved becomes warped, distorted, a smear of what it once was. Not an unfamiliar sight.

What once was several wounds becomes one enormous gash, oozing blood from every edge, and Zenos lets out a soft sigh as she places her palm in the center of it, feeling the mess of disgusting, torn flesh under her own. Just a man on the inside, Zenos is, and yet—so much more than that. A man that allows such an intimate portrait of him to be in her hands. A man who can see her just as wide open as this, without forcing open his way there.

She reaches for the salve next to the chair they're both seated in, she carefully balanced on one of his thighs. A compromising position, perhaps, to a stranger’s eyes—a former courtesan seated atop a half-dressed young prince, face flushed and breathing grown heavy and his cock slowly filling under the mostly undone robe he wears—but no other eyes are present. The two of them share an understanding that while carnal desires may come into what they do, their connection is not one of simple attraction. Yotsuyu admires, cherishes, perhaps even loves this man, may even feel her own arousal grow hot every time she makes him bleed—but she has no interest in consummating that desire in a traditional sense.

When the salve is spread evenly across Zenos' wound, she stands up, removing her kimono as she steps to the other side of the room, where the bed sits waiting. She lies face down, arms within reach of the bedposts she knows she will need to grip during what comes next.

The sound of a sword being unsheathed and a few footsteps is the only warning she gets before the first cut sinks deep into her skin, just below her shoulder blade. She cries out, neither exaggerating nor holding herself back, simply letting out an anguished wail as the blade slices through, ilm by ilm.

("Surely a willing, weak victim wouldn't be to my lord's taste," Yotsuyu had scoffed, when he had suggested the exchange.

"Ah, but _willing_ is the interesting part," he said. "It's unusual. Intriguing. And all the sweeter from someone who would rather be on the other end of the blade.")

The sword leaves her skin, finally, then immediately draws another line in a different direction. Then, another, shorter stroke.

He is drawing Yangxian characters, she knows. Practicing them in the most enjoyable way available to him. It would make her smile, if she wasn't preoccupied with screaming.

It's never easy to tell what character he's making with his bloody calligraphy, facing away as she is and distracted by pain besides, but this one seems more complicated than most, as stroke after stroke after stroke is burned into her skin. It could be the name of his newest sword, or a rebel leader whose standard he memorized.

In her heart, she pictures the character for "love."

She stops truly feeling the pain, after a while, though her body continues to shake and moan. An eerie calm always clouds over her mind after enough of this. It’s similar to her days spent letting men use her for hours at a time—but instead of hiding away from her reality, she feels like she's experiencing a new one, one brighter and stronger than that her body is forced to reside in. She feels… safe, a wholly unfamiliar concept in most of her waking hours. In the hands of a murderous, sadistic monster of a man.

Her screams turn to laughter in the few seconds before she blacks out.

-

"Apologies, my lord," Yotsuyu says when she wakes up and feels the cold sting of medicine on her back.

"It was only moments before I was finished. Do not trouble yourself with apologies, I’m aware of your limited tolerance."

She suppresses a shiver as he traces the lines of each wound, rather than smearing it all on at once. Like this, she can concentrate hard enough to draw the character in her mind as it is drawn on her skin.

It is not "love."

**Author's Note:**

> like i said, the ship list i was given for this challenge was wild. check me out on [@Slotheyyyyy](https://twitter.com/Slotheyyyyy) for future updates and/or screaming at [flyingthesky](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flyingthesky)!


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